The present invention pertains to compact discs or laser discs having encoded, reproducible tracks thereon. More particularly, the present invention pertains to such discs having editing means for selectively providing order of play data or other data either on the disc itself or provided separately. The present invention further pertains to a compact disc system including means for reading the order of play data from the editing means and for programming the compact disc player according to that data and means for selectively programming the editing means with order of play data. The compact disc might store audio data, video data, text, or software, or even a combination of these. The invention is particularly suited for audio data such as compact disc sound recordings, and the present invention will be described in connection with such a system, but it is likewise usable with video data, text, or software.
The editing means can be discrete programmable indicia on the compact disc which are readable by means on the disc player. Alternatively, the editing means can be means for scanning the playing side of a disc loaded into the player to detect the boundaries of the tracks thereon and means for comparing an identification code derived from the track boundary data with data in a table stored in a memory.
The prior art has lacked a preprogramming device provided with a compact disc for furnishing order of play data or data setting forth particular parameters of the disc. Rather, such prior art compact discs generally have a first side with digitally encoded, audio reproducible data thereon and a blank second side. The audio reproducible data might be organized into a plurality of spiral tracks arranged concentrically on the disc. Each track corresponds to, for example, a single selection of music.
Prior art compact disc players include a drawer-like receptacle for receiving the compact disc, positioning it, and rotating it to enable scanning by a playback system such as a laser system. The audio reproducible data modulates the laser light reflected from the disc, and the reflected, modulated beam is in turn demodulated to produce audio signals. The laser beam progresses spirally toward the center of the disc, along the tracks, to reproduce the audio signals.
Many conventional compact disc players feature internal memories providing capability for storing one or more programs controlling the desired order of the play of the tracks of the disc. This capability is provided since users frequently favor particular musical selections over others in the set of selections recorded on the various tracks upon the disc. The favored selections, however, are often recorded upon nonadjacent tracks so that less favored selections are interposed between those the user particularly desires to hear. Likewise, the listener may desire to hear all the selections recorded on the compact disc but in an order other than that in which they are recorded. By means of internal memories the compact disc player may be preprogrammed to play the individual tracks in any desired order, including skipping particular tracks or playing favored tracks more than once.
Many conventional compact disc players can be programmed for a particular order of play by means of a keyboard or the like arranged upon the control panel of the player. Once a compact disc is inserted and the player thus programmed, play is initiated, and the player proceeds to play the tracks on the disc in the preselected order. Such conventional programmable compact disc players require relatively complex programming in order to preset the order of play for each disc to be played, since the precise operation of the several memory and play controls must be understood to operate the player. Where the user desires to play more than one disc, with the selections on each played in a different sequence, several repetitions of the programming steps are required, and this is likely to become tiresome. This tediousness is aggravated if frequent recourse to instructions for programming the player is required. Moreover, persons whose capacity to understand and repeat the particular sequences of programming steps is limited, such as children, are likely to become frustrated due to inability to operate the machine rapidly. Worse, they may damage the machine in attempting to operate
Thus up to now, conventional compact disc players have lacked means whereby the disc itself provides order of play data or other data which may be automatically recognized and read by the player. In such a system, the disc may be simply received by the player and the play initiated so that thereafter the player self-programs and the recorded selections according to the instructions encoded the disc.
To a very the prior art has provided control data storage me a prerecorded medium from which audio or other signals be reproduced. U.S. Pat. No. 4,338,644 to Staar discloses a magnetic tape cassette which is provided with an electronic memory, including semiconductor circuits. The electronic memory is housed within the cassette and is read by a peripheral device which indicates, for example, the instantaneous position of the tape or the location of specific selections on the tape from information stored in the cassette memory. The memory can likewise be read by a properly equipped cassette player when the player receives the cassette.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,876,297 to Appeldorn et al. shows a transparent slide frame which is provided, on one face, with a strip of magnetic recording tape. When the slide frame is positioned for projection of the image thereon, the magnetic strip may be read to reproduce an identifying message.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,424,539 shows a magnetic disk having a central track which may be read through the disk envelope. The patent states that the normal data track lies toward the concentric interior portion of the disk and the outward portions thereof do not normally contain data. Thus the patent discloses the placement of control tracks, readable through the disk envelope on such outward portion. The control tracks which may comprise one or more distinct tracks are encoded with control function data such as index pulse, sector signals, velocity feedback and/or a media alignment signal.